So I don't have to give credit to anyone but me this time. It's Valentine's month and I wanted to make it special for all the children in my charge. As you may know from another post, every week I get the chance to hang out with some pretty special kids. My superheros and 2 special friends. They were thrilled last week when we did the
Chocolate Pretzel Buttons so I decided we will do at least one fun Valentine's Day treat each week until the actual day! This week I thought about a great after school snack! Who doesn't like pizza? (I know there are some of you who don't like pizza..but most children do).
What I like most about making pizza, is that it makes me feel like a real chef. You know, I'm not a cook, or even a baker, I'm just a girl who likes to bake. But making pizza makes me feel like a cook. Why? Because I don't need to weigh or measure anything. I can throw ingredients together and it is pretty safe. (I might add that my uncle owned a pizza place on the boardwalk in Seaside....Yes..that would be the Jersey Shore.)
OK..you see the ingredients up above. The only thing you don't see is olive oil and mozzarella cheese (for those children who might not understand the beauty of Cheddar on a pizza. (Secret ingredient for a famous Jersey pizza place). Go ahead at preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
So I chose the perfect size heart shaped cookie cutter and had the children press all the way through the dough, but still keeping it in the dough. (See below) This way the heart can just pop out!
Then we painted the heart with olive oil. Now, I painted the whole round dough and then sprinkled some garlic powder on it. I tried this in two ways. First, I thought let's make one with sauce just on the heart and garlic on the outer part of the dough. Hoping it would turn out like garlic bread or something. While it worked this way, it is much better they way all the children did it. Slather that thing up with olive oil and then
paint the pizza dough with sauce. I used tomato sauce with garlic, basil and oregano.
Be sure not to use too much sauce. Too much will make for a soggy pizza. We put about 3 heaping spoonfuls of tomato sauce on each little pizza and then added our cheese. Here is my plug for cheddar. If you haven't had cheddar and/or jack cheese on a pizza...try it. It gives it a special tang...really really good!
Here is the one that I did...see I left the crust plain...the plain garlic crust around the heart wasn't as tasty as the rest of them.
Really the toughest part is getting that cookie cutter to go through that dough. But..they had no problem.. after all, they do have superpowers. ;)
Really, we are convinced that there is no such thing as too much garlic...so sprinkle away. After we trimmed our pizza's with cheese and pepperoni, I placed it in the oven..at that point turning the oven down to 400 degrees. Baked those beauties for 8 minutes..or until it looks perfect!
Let it cool for about a minute so you can handle it and pop that heart right out.
You can see that it leaves a cute little cut out heart (and his crust is all yummy with extra cheese and sauce.)
Here is my youngest superhero and his heart shaped pizza. He was so proud and very excited to taste!
Just look at that! I had 5 very happy children today! Below is our friend...look at that adorable smile! It just makes my heart full of joy!
So it was a success...we made heart shaped pizzas...everyone loved them..and hopefully they all knew how much I loved seeing them smile!
Don't you want to show your kids how much you love them...buy giving them a loving snack that makes them smile. Just look at that beautiful girl below - she says it all with her smile! Happy Valentine's Month! Enjoy and thanks for stopping by the Kitchen this afternoon!
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